As the geographical domain in which companies conduct business continues to expand, video teleconferencing technology attempts to bring the world closer together. However, to fully satisfy the requirement of having a face to face meeting, it is necessary for the video conferencing technology to provide real-time, multipoint conferencing that is a pleasure to utilize. However, in multipoint video conferencing, one main obstacle is the inefficiency of scheduling conferences.
In the current market, most multipoint video calls are scheduled in advance through companies that own Multipoint Control Units (MCUs). An MCU provides the capability for three or more terminals and gateways to participate in a multipoint conference. If a company owns more than one MCU, it has more flexibility in hosting video conferences. However, each MCU must be operated independently from the other MCUs in setting up and controlling video conferences. Additionally, the capacity of each MCU is limited to video conferences controlled by that MCU. The resources of the multiple MCUs cannot be combined to promote more efficient scheduling.
Each MCU is able to communicate with multiple conference participants. In an exemplary system, the MCU has ten participant slots, and thus can support ten users. The MCU may be configured so that more than one conference is going on at one time. For instance, a four participant conference and a five participant conference can be simultaneously supported on an MCU with a capacity of ten participants. Due to inefficient scheduling, many MCUs have extra capacity that cannot be used. In the example above, the MCU has capacity for ten participants but only nine participants are scheduled for conferences.
One reason why most multipoint video calls are scheduled in advance is that there is a low probability of successfully finding an open MCU quickly without prior scheduling. This probability is low largely because a conference scheduler must contact each MCU separately to attempt to initiate a video conference. If a large number of MCUs could be contacted simultaneously, the probability of finding an available MCU quickly and initiating an unscheduled video conference would be greatly increased. Additionally, if an MCU could share its excess capacity with another MCU, more conferences could be accommodated. The availability of this feature would facilitate escaping the bonds of scheduled video conferences and allowing impromptu video conferences to abound.
Therefore, it is evident that there is a need in the art for a system and method for operating multiple MCUs from a single control point. This will reduce the burden on any single MCU and allow greater ease in initiating a video conference.
Therefore, it is also evident that there is a need in the art for a system and method for operating multiple MCUs from a single control point to schedule conferences on multiple MCUs in such a way as to minimize the number of unused participant slots on each MCU.
Therefore, it is also evident that there is a need in the art for a system and method for operating multiple MCUs from a single control point in a manner that will allow video conference initiation without the need for prior scheduling.